To my surprise, the freemen decided to postpone the vote while they discussed their options. Or so Christopher told me the next morning.

My morning passed me by and I quickly went downstairs to grab the same old egg and bread.

The waitress surprised me by giving me some extra soup with my food.

At my curious glance, she smiled and said “Its on the House. Mr.Craw wanted to let you know that he appreciated the sudden generous donation he got from you boys last night.” After saying that she winked at me and walked away with a certain sway in her hips that hadn’t been there the day before.

I stared puzzled at her as she walked away, before I realized that Mr.Craw must have been the owner of the inn whom had lent us the use of his main room.

I bit my lip in an old habit as i thought about how Mr.Craw knew a bunch of armed men had been in his inn the same night the prison was broken into. I shook my head and decided to just be grateful for the fact that I got some extra food. There was no use worrying about what had already been done.

The soup was delicious and I finished my meal in record time.

I quickly left the inn after that. I didn’t have anywhere in particular that I wanted to go, so I decided to just spend my time wandering. I found myself enjoying watching the people, all of whom had different animal features. Like long elephant ears or changes in eye shape or patches of scales or feathers instead of skin.

However, people-watching couldn’t hold my attention for more than an hour, so I continued my exploration of the city.

Eventually I found myself on the poorer side of town on a lonely street.

A shriek distracted me from my sightseeing as a young woman sprinted down the street towards me, her head turned watching for pursuers that I couldn’t see.

When she looked back towards me she drew up short, skidding across the dusty road. “D-Don’t kill me! I-I barely know magic! I didn’t mean to a-attack The Lord. I swear.” She spoke to me with fear evident in her voice.

I stopped to study her, confused by the fear she was showing towards me. She looked to be sixteen or so, she had a small face, with brown hair reaching to her shoulders, on top of her head sat two small horns. Her green eyes looked healthy and undrugged. So I hoped that that wasn’t the reason she was so scared of me.

“Brother? What are you doing here? There was no need for the order to send two of us.” A voice filled with surprise spoke up from behind her.

I turned to the new speaker, finding a fit middle aged man staring at me. Short black hair turning gray lay atop his head. He held a long sword in one hand and a short sword in the other. But that wasn’t what caught my attention, because above his head sat two black cat ears and a small black tail poked out from behind him.

“Brother?” I said quietly, confusion evident in my voice. I continued in a louder voice “The order didn’t send me. I just happened to be passing by, what is going on?”

The man looked at me in confusion, “This is order business boy. If you weren’t sent to help me, then you should just move along and let me deal with this.” Irritation entered his voice as he finished.

The young woman turned to me, her body obviously relaxing as she made a decision. “I don’t care who you two are. I am w-warning you! You might be the Black Cats, b-but I have magic and I am not afraid to use it!”

I looked at the woman with one eyebrow raised. The sound of shifting feet turned my attention to the man who was charging at the woman with his swords raised.

I jumped in front of the woman. Drawing my dagger out of its sheath, I deflected his longsword and dodged his shortsword by inches.

The man backed off staring at me. “What are you doing?” He asked calmly, studying me as I drew my rapier.

A smile came onto my face as I adopted one of my favorite personas from D&D. I gave a small bow to the man. “Forgive me, I haven’t introduced myself yet, have I? My name is Drew, I am a priest of Maria and a Master Swordsman. And who might you be?” I said, channeling my inner suave.

The man just stared at me for a second, before his eyes narrowed. “I am known as The Hunter. You didn’t answer my question, what are you doing?”

“The Hunter? Really?" I asked incredulously "I think it is fairly obvious what I am doing. I am stopping you from killing this poor kid.” I responded with total nonchalance.

“Hey! I-I am older than you are.” The young woman spoke up from behind me.

The Hunter ignored her, “You are a very foolish kid.” He said to me as he lowered his swords, “And you are a very lucky kid. This mission is not worth killing a brother over.” The Hunter sheathed his swords, ignoring the fact that I still had mine out. “However, I would watch your back if I were you, that woman behind you has a bounty on her head, and the Black Cats won’t be the only ones after her.” After saying that, he turned around and left. He must have used some kind of magic, because before my eyes, he turned into shadows and disappeared.

“Shit. Shit. Shit. I messed up. T-thanks for saving me, but I have to get out of here.” The woman backed up as she said that.

I turned to her, releasing my persona. “Who are you and why are they after you exactly?” I asked.

She tugged on her hair in nervousness, before responding “My name is Rose and I-I guess I am a mage.…” She lowered her eyes away from me. “Again, thank you for saving me. B-but I can’t stay here.” She turned around.

“Wait!” I yelled out. “If you need a place to hide, I can probably-” I stopped as the pendant around my throat started heating up. I searched the buildings around us which were still oddly empty.

A glint shined from the building to my right and I jumped on top of Rose, knocking her to the ground.

“Why-” She started before I pointed at an arrow stuck in the ground a few meters away from us.

I picked her up off of the ground, before dragging her towards the nearest building. I kicked down the door and shoved her inside, I rolled into the building after her, ducking just in time as another arrow punctured where my back had been.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

Silently, I thanked Maria that I still had my sword and dagger in my hands, giving me my Swordsman skills.

“That was fast.” I said as I hid behind the wall of the building.

“W-What do you mean?” Rose whispered, obviously a little out of breath.

“I just didn’t expect anyone to be coming for you so soon after the Black Cat.” I responded, my voice unwavering.

Rose was about to respond when a man outside the building yelled. “Bring the girl out here and we will let you go Black Cat! We don’t want to get on the bad side of your order!”

I took a deep breath, before I adopted my persona again. I laughed out loud, making sure that the men outside could hear me. “I am terribly sorry for this, but I am afraid I can’t give you this ‘girl’! After all, I got to her first. But if you want her, come and get her.”

They started to discuss something outside, while I motioned for Rose to move quietly up a set of stairs.

She nodded as she started moving, I followed quietly behind her.

Finally the voices stopped and the same man spoke to me, “I am sorry about this Black Cat, but we want that bounty!”

I stopped sneaking and ran up the stairs as fast as I could, pushing Rose ahead of me. The sound of arrows going “thunk” behind us hurried our footsteps.

The second floor was mostly devoid of furniture and again I wondered where all of the people on this street were. The thought didn’t bother me for long, as I realized that there weren’t any exits out of the second floor except for a small window, which I couldn’t fit through.

I hurried to grab a large dresser and placed it in front of the entrance to the stairwell.

“Well, it looks like I have trapped us in here. You said you were a mage? Is there anything you can do to them once they get up here?” I asked as the sound of arrows hitting the dresser stopped.

“Umm. I-I don’t really know how to use my magic. The first time was just an accident.” She whispered the last part.

“Ok.” I stared at the dresser trying to think of a plan. “When those men come through the door, I want you to think of exactly what you did and what you felt when you cast your spell. Then copy what you did. If it doesn’t work, then just stay behind me and try not to get hurt. These guys are professionals and if you try to help me, you might die for it.” As I finished saying that, the dresser was blown back and a large dark skinned man walked out from behind it.

“[Barrier]” I casted as arrows shot at me from behind the man. They bounced harmlessly off of my barrier.

The large man pulled out a sword large enough to match his size. He swung his sword at my barrier. I carefully manipulated the barrier to allow him and his swing through.

He stumbled at the lack of resistance as I reformed the barrier behind him.

I pointed my rapier at him and quoted one of my favorite lines in a spanish accent “Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die.”

The man just stared at me in confusion, my smile dropped a little at the fact that no one in this world will ever get that reference.

The man gets over his confusion quickly as he swings his sword at me, I duck under his swing, stepping forward from underneath his swing, I try to stab him with my sword.

He backed up, dodging my thrust and redirected his sword faster than I thought possible. There was no time for me to dodge the swing, so I cast “[Riposte]” on my dagger, redirecting his sword and stabbed him through the throat, killing him.

He dropped at my feet.

My smile was gone now.

I turned to my barrier, six men were waiting on the other side. The arrows had stopped and everyone had grabbed melee weapons.

I manipulated the barrier to let one of them through, but to my surprise, another wolfen man jumped through after him.

The wolfen man wielded two short swords, while the other, a man with goat horns wielded a giant battle axe.

The two worked well together, always keeping me on my feet as the goat man would force me to dodge, but the wolfen man would always be waiting for me at the place I dodged to. I was forced to use [Riposte] multiple times without getting a killing blow off.

I could feel my barrier skill draining my mana and knew that if I didn’t drop it soon, I was going to be out of the mana I desperately needed to win these fights.

Quickly, I made a decision, as I dodged the axe of the goat man and stepped into the swing of the Wolfen man. I grunted as his blow chopped into my arm, but I still managed to force my sword into his chest aiming for where I knew his heart to be. The Wolfen man dropped to the ground and I twirled around the axe of the goat man as I impaled him as well.

“[Heal]” I casted and picked up my dagger, I turned to face the last four men, but by then, I could feel my barrier spell breaking.

I grunted from exhaustion as my barrier broke before my eyes.

Four men stood before me, all armed to the teeth. One of whom had chainmail covering himself from head to toe.

I swayed from exhaustion, I maybe had one more spell in me, two, If I pushed it. All four of them came at me. I did my best to backtrack, but one of them threw a knife at me, which forced me to use [Dash] to dodge. I stumbled and a sword pierced my stomach.

A scream echoed out from behind me as I fell to the ground. I summoned up the energy to cast one last spell as fire roared above me, blinding me.

“[Hea-]” I blacked out.

….

Water droplets hitting my face woke me up.

“I’m sorry. I-I’m so so sorry. Please don’t die.” I opened my eyes to Rose kneeling over me. Her hair covered her eyes, preventing her from seeing that my eyes had opened.

Tears fell onto my face making me reach my hand up to her face and wipe her tears. “Hey, if Inigo Montoya doesn’t die after being stabbed in the stomach, then riding away on a horse, what makes you think that a little poke from a sword would kill me?” I jokingly said.

Her crying stopped as it turned turned to hiccuping and laughter “W-who the hell is Inigo Montoya?”

I laughed a little as I answered, “A personal hero of mine, he’s from a story I once heard.”

I focused in on my body and sighed in relief. I had leveled up, which explained why I was still alive. My level up must have contributed to my healing ability. I took a moment to imagine what my character sheet would look like now if I were still in game.

Drew Lvl 5 Swordsman/Priest

Priest Abilities:

Heal

Purify

Barrier

Area Of Effect Heal

Swordsman Abilities:

Dash (Move forward three meters dealing damage as you go)

Riposte (block all damage for a second)

Swordsman’s Knowledge

Duel (Target opponent ignores surroundings and only targets you)

I won’t get any more abilities until I get to level seven or so. Then at level ten, I should be able to upgrade my classes.

“D-Drew? Are you ok?” Rose interrupted my thoughts.

“Yeah. I seem to be fine.” I answered as I sat up.

I gagged a little as the smell of burnt flesh hit my nose. I quickly plugged my nose and asked “How long was I out? And what happened to the people attacking us?”

“You were only asleep for a few minutes, a-and the people that attacked us, w-well I u-used magic.” A slightly hysterical smile comes to her face.

I looked around at the bodies lying on the floor next to me. Every one of them was burnt, even the floor was charred.

I gulped at the sight. “How did you stop the fire from spreading?” Was all I could think to ask.

She looked around at the destruction and I could see a small flash of fear on her face before she answered “Once I created the f-fire, I could control it. I s-simply told it to stop.”

I looked around at the destruction again. “I am glad that you can control it. Or else we would all be dead.”

I stood up and offered Rose a hand. “Come on, we should get out of here.”